Open source relates to computer source code that is publicly available and may be freely accessed and used by programmers developing code. Open source may be provided as binary files or libraries to be linked with a user's' project, as code files to be compiled with a user's project, as code snippets to be added and optionally edited by a user as part of a file, any other format, or any combination thereof.
Open source may be used for a multiplicity of reasons, such as but not limited to: saving programming and debugging time and effort by obtaining a functional verified unit; porting or programming code to an environment in which the user has insufficient experience or knowledge; adding generic options such as graphic support, printing, or the like, or others. The ease of obtaining such code on the Internet has greatly increased the popularity of its usage.
Despite the many advantages, source code may also carry hazards. One such danger may relate to the need to trust code received from an external source. Such code may contain bugs, time or space inefficiencies, or even viruses, Trojan horses, or the like. Such threat may be overcome by using only open source provided by known and trusted origin.
Another problem in using open source relates to the licenses which may be associated with any open source unit. Any such license may incur specific limitations or requirements on a user or a user's project developed using the open source.
Some licenses may require copyright and notification of the license. Others may require that if a user modified the used open source, for example fixed a bug, the user shares the modified version with other users in the same manner as the original source code was shared. Further licenses may require sharing the users' code developed with the open source with other users. The extent for which sharing is required may vary between files linked with files containing open source, and the whole user project. Further requirements may even have implications on the user's clients which may use the project developed with open source.
Open source may also pose legal limitations, such as limitations on filing patent applications associated with material from the open source, the inability to sue the open source developer if it does not meet the expectations, or the like.
Once the requirements are known, a user may decide whether it is acceptable for him or her to comply with the requirements, take the risks, and use the open source. However, some users do not pay attention to the license and its terms or intentionally ignore them and do not comply with the requirements. In further cases, a user who incorporated open source into a project may have left the company without taking the appropriate action and without notifying other team members, thus leaving the company in a non-complying and unaware situation. Many companies are thus unaware that their product comprises open source while they do not comply with the terms. In some cases, such compliance may not even be an option for the company.
Such ignoring may have severe consequences for the user and the organization. For example, company's code may undergo due diligence in which the situation may be detected and harm the company's value or options. In other situations, a company may wish to form business relations with another company that demands the first company to confirm it does not use open source, or does not use open source which is subject to specific licenses.
In other situations, the non-compliance may be detected by a third party that may demand the company to comply with the license. Such third party may be a competitor, a non-profit organization, a governmental organization, an open source developer, an open source license enforcement organization, or the like. For example, such third party may demand that the company exposes its code, which many companies cannot agree to since the code contains highly confidential material. If the company is not willing to comply with the license terms, it may be required to stop using the open source, which may mean re-writing parts of a product which may even be marketed, thus also causing great harm to the company. Such third party may also require the company to pay substantial fines, or the like.
Thus, it may be required to identify whether a programming project contains open source. If so, it may further be required to identify which open source files, libraries or code snippets are used, and optionally under which license, such that a company using open source may decide whether it wishes to take the risks and comply with the terms, rewrite the code or otherwise resolve the situation.